`A FIGHTER FOR THE BEST IDEA'
Remembering a celebrated theatre icon
With the passing of Calgary playwright Sharon Pollock on April 22, Canada lost one of its most celebrated theatre titans.
Pollock, 85, spent 50 years as a writer, penning more than 46 scripts for radio, television, stage and even ballet. But as well known as her work was, she was equally respected for her honest, unflinching opinions.
Calgary actor Stephen Hair, best known for his portrayal of Scrooge in Theatre Calgary's A Christmas Carol, and who starred in Pollock's final work, Blow Wind High Water, calls her “a giant among us who loved nothing more than a feisty argument of ideas.”
It was Dennis Garnhum, at the close of his 11-year tenure as artistic director of Theatre Calgary, who commissioned Pollock to write Blow Wind High Water to open TC'S 50th anniversary season in 2017. He says she was “a true champion of the arts: a fighter for the best idea and the most valuable outcome no matter how complicated that choice might be.”
Simon Mallet, founder of Downstage Theatre, who directed the premières of Pollock's Blow Wind High Water and Man Out Of Joint, praised Pollock for “challenging convention at every turn, always honest and fierce in her pursuit of the best work possible.”
Stafford Arima, TC'S current artistic director says of Pollock's feisty personality, “it was like a stunning tsunami wave that engulfed a room. She had a no-filter way of communicating.”
Pollock's edgy personality is reflected in such historical works as Walsh, One Tiger to a Hill, The Komagata Maru Story and Man Out Of Joint, which are incisive, provocative and highly critical of the events they depict.
Pollock was awarded the Governor General Award for Drama in 1981 for her Lizzie Borden drama Blood Relations and again in 1984 for her semi-autobiographical drama Doc about her upbringing in a dysfunctional New Brunswick home.
She began her career in theatre in 1964, working as an actor at the Beaverbrook Playhouse in Fredericton where she met her second husband, actor Michael Ball, and moved with him to Calgary in 1966 when he was offered a position at the newly created theatre department of the University of Calgary.
Two years later, she became frustrated with the state of Canadian theatre, insisting it offered no uniquely Canadian voices. She wanted “other actors to stand up and say my words, to speak directly through an experience I shared with other Albertans and Canadians.”
In 2012, Pollock was named to the Order of Canada for her extraordinary contributions to theatre and the arts in Canada. This is an honour she shares with her father, who was a celebrated Maritime physician. “When my father got the Order of Canada, I never thought much about it but I know it meant a great deal to him and it means a great deal to me, too,” she said at the time. “I've been fortunate to get a number of awards but the Order of Canada is special.”
D. Michael Dobbin, the producing director of Alberta Theatre Projects from 1978 to 1983, says Pollock's “accomplishments were astounding. Her personality was hugely outrageous and it gave her courage to say and do things that few in our circle would say or do. ”